Commentary by Lt. Colonel John Lewis Cook, USA
(ret.)
The nomination battle
over the next Secretary of Defense is now over and the winner is the Obama
administration. The loser is the U.S.
military along with the American people.
The Republicans in the Senate put up a good fight but, in the end, they
simply didn’t have enough votes. The
Democrats voted right along party lines and it was enough to push a certified
idiot into the top slot at the Department of Defense.
In all fairness, it was
a brilliant move on the part of President Obama. If he was after the perfect fall guy to cover
all his mistakes as Commander in Chief, it is hard to image a better
choice. Chuck Hagel is, without
question, the perfect guy. He makes
Obama look like a bipartisan statesman, reaching across the aisle to pick a
Republican to lead the nation’s military.
However, Hagel is a Republican in name only, which makes him a Rino. So
why did Hagel agree to do this? It’s the
same old story in Washington, DC, where guys like Hagel are very vulnerable to
an appeal to their ego.
To be sure, for a
president to reach across the aisle can be a great thing. President Reagan did it when he selected Cap
Weinberger as the Secretary of Defense and that turned out to be a stroke of
genius. Weinberger literally rebuilt the
Defense Department after Vietnam and convinced the Soviet Union that the United
States would win the arms race. In this
head to head battle, Weinberger won and deserves most of the credit for the
collapse of the Soviet Union. Without
question, he is the most successful Secretary of Defense in the modern era,
dwarfing all those who have come after him.
A modest man with an incredible intellect, we may never see his likes
again. His accomplishments are even more dramatic when you consider that both
houses of congress belonged to the Democrats during this period and both houses
hated Reagan.
Unfortunately, Chuck
Hegal is no Cap Weinberger. Weinberger
was a giant and Hagel is a pigmy. Reagan
picked Weinberger to rebuild the nation’s defenses. And that’s what he did. Obama picked Hagel to be a fall guy and Hagel
fell for it. Hagel is no Weinberger, no
matter how hard the White House tries to spin this story. His performance before the Senate during his
nomination hearing was beyond bad, it was shocking. Any man with any decency would have simply
withdrawn on his own at this point, realizing that he was not up to this
awesome task. But there is precious
little decency left in Washington and it all comes down to votes. And the Democrats had the votes and Omaba got
his guy and Hagel will get his day in the sun.
In the end, it didn’t
make any difference that Hagel was exposed as an anti-Israel bigot, regardless
of the fact that the only true ally we have in that part of the world is
Israel. Nor did it matter that he was willing
to throw Israel under the bus. The only
thing that mattered to the Democrats in the Senate was that this was Obama’s
boy and they would confirm him, come hell or high water.
Perhaps, in the end, it
doesn’t make a lot of difference since no candidate for this office could
perform as we would expect in today’s political environment. Since Obama has managed to castrate all of
his senior military officers, any candidate for the highest office in the
Department of Defense would have to be a eunuch. And Chuck Hagel fits this position
perfectly. This is something Cap
Weinberger would never agree to, but it’s a different world now, where winning
the nations’s wars in no longer a high priority, or even a condition for the
job.
What Hagel doesn’t
understand is why he was selected in the first place. If he had an IQ higher than room temperature,
he would have realized why he was selected and might have reconsidered, but he
didn’t. Obama wasn’t about to select a
loyal Democrat for this position because the coming heat is going to be very
hot. Hagel is going to have to take the
heat for the eventual defeat in Afghanistan, not Obama. Looking at it from Obama’s perspective, Hagel
was the perfect choice, a washed up former politician from Kansas, who managed
to get himself elected to the Senate as a Republican was a gift from
heaven. And on top of all that, he
wanted the job. So, in the end, Hagel is Obama’s
firewall. And, if necessary, Obama will
not hesitate to throw Chuck under the bus, blaming him for losing America’s
longest war, where Americans keep dying, every day, to prop up President Hamid
Karzai’s interlocking criminal enterprise.
Will the American
public buy it? The answer is yes. Those few that were paying attention have
already moved on, waiting for the next episode of Survivor. This is just a blip on the radar screen.
About the Author
Lieutenant Colonel John
Lewis Cook, United States Army (Retired), “served as the Senior Advisor to the
Ministry of Interior in Kabul, Afghanistan, with responsibility for developing
the force structure for the entire Afghan National Police. As of 2012, this force totals 157,000. From March 2008 until August 2012, his access
and intimate associations with all levels of the Afghan government and
coalition forces have provided him with an unprecedented insight into the
policies which will determine the outcome of the war. It is this insight, coupled with his contacts
and associations throughout Afghanistan that form the basis of Afghanistan: The
Perfect Failure.
Click to read more
about Lt. Colonel John Lewis Cook
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